The University of Maryland’s Urban Studies and Planning Program (URSP) ranks #10 among all urban and regional planning programs in the U.S., according to the 2007 Faculty Scholarly Productivity Index prepared by Academic Analytics, a for-profit company that has ranked academic programs in a wide range of fields. As reported in the Nov. 26, 2007 issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education, Academic Analytics claims that its rankings of graduate programs are the first objective measurements of per-capita scholarly production.

The annual ranking utilizes data on the numbers of books and journal articles written by faculty members who are listed on a Ph.D. Program’s website, the number of times other scholars have cited these publications, and the grant monies, honors, awards the faculty members have received. It then uses an algorithm to produce a per-capita faculty productivity measure. This type of measure offers an alternative to reputational surveys that critics believe are biased in favor of older and larger academic programs and against newer, smaller, and/or rapidly-improving programs that have very productive faculty members.

URSP’s highest scores were in journal publications per faculty member and citation of faculty member publications. Overall, the University of Maryland had 17 of its academic programs ranked in the top 10 in their fields.